'If Leuchtenstein were only at home----'
'Ah!' the Countess answered with a touch of impatience; 'but then he is not. If he were--well, even he could scarcely make troops where there are none.'
'There are generally some to be hired,' the Waldgrave answered. 'What if we send to Halle, or Weimar, and inquire? A couple of hundred pikes would settle the matter.'
'God forbid!' my lady answered with a shudder. 'I have heard enough of the doings of such soldiers. The town has not deserved that.'
The Waldgrave looked at me, and slightly shrugged his shoulders; as much as to say that my lady was impracticable. But I, agreeing with every word she said, only loved her the more, and could make him no answer, even if my duty had permitted it. I hastened to suggest that, the castle being safe, the better plan was to wait, keeping on our guard, and see what happened; which, indeed, seemed also to be the only course open to us.
My lady saw this and agreed; I withdrew, to spend the rest of the day in a feverish march between the one gate and the other. We could muster no more than twelve effective men, including the Waldgrave; and though these might suffice for the bare defence of the place, which had only two assailable points, the paucity of our numbers kept me in perpetual fear. I knew my lady's proud nature so well that I dreaded humiliation for her as I might have feared death for another; with a terror which made the possibility of her capture by the malcontents a misery to me, a nightmare which would neither let me rest nor sleep.
My lord soon recovered his spirits. In an hour or two he was as buoyant and cheerful as before, dividing the blame of the contretemps between Fraulein Anna and myself, and hinting that if he had been left to manage the matter, the guilty would have suffered, and Dietz not gone scot-free. But I trembled. I did not see how we could be surprised; I thought it improbable that the townsfolk would try to effect anything against us; impossible that they should succeed. Yet, when the stern swell of one of Luther's hymns rose from the town at sunset, and I remembered how easily men's hearts were inflamed by those strains; and again, when a huge bonfire in the market-place dispelled the night, and for hours kept the town restless and waking, I shuddered, fearing I knew not what. I will answer for it, my lady, who never ceased to wear a cheerful countenance, did not sleep that night one half so ill as I.
And yet I was caught napping. A little before daybreak, when all was quiet, I went to take an hour's rest. I had lain down, and, as far as I could judge later, had just fallen into a doze, when a tremendous shock, which made the very walls round me tremble, drew me to my feet as if a giant hand had plucked me from the bed. A crashing sound, mingled with the shiver of falling glass, filled the air. For a few seconds I stood trembling and bewildered in the middle of the room--in the state of disorder natural to a man rudely awakened. I could not on the instant collect myself or comprehend what had happened. Then, in a flash, the fears of the day returned to my mind, and springing to the door, half-dressed as I was, I ran down to the courtyard.
Some of the servants were already there, a white-cheeked, panic-stricken group of men and women intermixed; but, for a moment, I could get no answer to my questions. All spoke at once, none knew. Then--it was just growing light--from the direction of the stable-gate a man came running out of the dusk with a half-pike on his shoulder.
'Quick!' he cried. 'This way, give me a musket.'